Thursday, September 13, 2007

Rare Don Martin, plus more Dentist

Don Martin is a super cartoony cartoonist whose view of life is firmly rooted in humanity. He doesn't draw "realistic" but he appeals to the real observations and funny bones of real humans. No whitebread mentality. Hey check out his early work for science fiction magazines!

So fitting that the young Don Martin cut his teeth on Sci-Fi illustration. His highly personal drawing style is SO bizarre, so alien - it's as if a Martian cartoonist came to earth to make fun of stupid, ugly humans.

To Don Martin, all earthlings are retarded - even animals. (His animals are really cool! Makes me wish he'd drawn more of them.)

Along with his parodies of Old Masters oil paintings (like Blue Boy), his images of nasty couples in urban squalor, fat women with razor stubble, "sexy" women, and images of people in excruciating pain - these are my favorite aspects of his work.

The last illustration is the only one I'd seen before - the one with the weird owl/sausage-like aliens and the girl's prominent ass. The original was auctioned off on eBay recently - last year, I think. I followed it until it went out of my price range and beyond - went for a ton of money.

Now contrast the effort, talent, vision and composition it took to draw those cartoons with the Baltimore City Paper's Cartoon Contest.

http://citypaper.com/special/story.asp?id=14087

I saw these today and almost vomitted blood into my own ass.

The descriptions for these things are worse. Just look at the one for the first prize cartoon. "Chris Minetree has a good, fundamental understanding of what makes a comic a comic. That paired with fresh ideas and a funny delivery make for a winner. I'm not a huge fan of halftones and gray washes to mask a lack of background, but the dark humor behind these big-eyed cute characters is irresistible." Then view it (you have been warned) I can't believe that that poorly drawn, unfunny, sterile (at least it isn't as bad as Cathy). Ironically, all the cartoons that came in other places look much better drawn than that eyesore, but here's the one thing that all of those cartoons have in common: none of them are nearly as funny these Don Martin pages.

Ahh, Don Martin can draw a sexy girl arse when he wants to! His style is really well-adapted for sci-fi. If I could have afforded the original of the belly-button owl people (not a chance), I would have snatched it up, no question. It's a completely original and appealing image!